Training Log Archive: Bash

Train from Venice to Verona to Fortezza to Welsburg-Monguelfo. Got our packs ready for trekking in the Dolomites.

I'd have to count at least part of today's exploration of Venice as orienteering! I was particularly concerned about the directions to our little hotel, which mostly involved street names that weren't on my map - and mostly weren't posted in the real world either, as it turned out. I had a very old map of Venice from my university backpacking days, but the nice thing about a city built in the Middle Ages is that my map was still current. I spiked the hotel, which was good, since we were carrying our luggage in the hot sun, then we made our way to San Marco Square, where we didn't spend much time since we aren't pigeon fans. After that, I put away the map (except for occasional relocation exercises), and we wandered for hours down narrow alleyways, exploring the town and - most importantly - staying awake rather than succumbing to jet lag. Very cool place. I think I'm going to gain weight on this trip - the food is all wonderful.

My next serious navigation challenge will be finding our hotel in Venice.

Wed. morning group ride on a VERY hot day. It was just 'Bent, Stan and me today, and we took it easier than usual, enjoying the chance to chat and cool down from our weekend of biking. We learned that Stan is the Chair of Caledon Community Services - a very busy volunteer position around here.

On the way home from our bike ride, we met lots of police officers investigating the disturbing discovery of a murder victim in the Palgrave Forest & Wildlife Area, which we think of as our own back yard. After speaking with a couple of officers, I picked up some orienteering maps at home and biked back to the command post in case they could be used to assist in the ongoing search for evidence. They were pleased to get the maps, but curious as to how some girl on a mountain bike could show up knocking at their door, given that the roads are closed in the area. I explained that I'd come over on trails, and they looked reassured - as long as I didn't cross to the east side of Duffy's Lane, which I had no intention of doing.

Unplanned rest day - and just as well, given some disturbing happenings in the area. My computer knows whenever we're going away, and it always craps out. This time I lost access to all data (other than e-mail) from the last 2 weeks since my last back-up. Sigh. Fortunately, I'd sent other people copies of everything important (articles I'd written, corporate tax info, etc.), so I'm not in bad shape after asking to have my documents sent back to me - other than having 6 GB of data on my hard drive that my computer says I'm not permitted to access. After spending the morning doing a few things that the Dell help line suggested, they asked me to start Windows in Safe Mode. I got the blue screen of death in Safe Mode - aaacckkkk! Last time that happened, I spent days reinstalling Windows and all my programs. This time I was able to restart Windows normally, and now I'm not shutting off my laptop until we leave for Europe. And then it's time to shop. This computer hates me.

Today we're thinking about our many friends who started racing in Raid The North Extreme this morning. The first leg of the event is a 3.5 day nonstop race in the Queen Charlotte Islands in B.C. To say that we're envious is an extreme understatement! We're hoping for some news soon on Sleepmonsters.

My lungs feel tight this morning - probably the result of inhaling so much particulate matter on the weekend (dust on the trails). Hope that goes away soon!

My 2nd lap was just before dawn, and I needed lights for the first third of the course. Good thing it wasn't pitch black, as my Digital Head Trip was failing right from the start, in spite of performing well in tests at home. I didn't do much of a warm-up at 5 a.m., but at least I didn't need to wait long at the transition, since VO2Max appeared right on time after another speedy lap. The air was cold and wonderful, and some of the dust had settled with a little more moisture at the end of the night. At this time of day, there are fewer riders on the race course - nice. I knew I wasn't going quite as fast as last night, plus I had more darkness during my lap, which made me a bit more cautious. I'm not a sprinter, and it doesn't come naturally for me to do two 1-hour race pace efforts in a 12-hour period! Although I enjoy 36-hr adventure races, I find that 2 hrs of all-out biking in a relay event is plenty for me.

I'm not sure if it's meaningful, but VO2Max was 40% faster than me last year and 30% faster this year. I was also closer to 'Bent's times this year - about 3 min. per lap behind him instead of 6 min. As a masters athlete, I'm always grasping for any small signs of improvement (as opposed to decline!!)

24 Hrs of Summer Solstice - Albion Hills

7th year for the Tree Huggers. Great team this year - about half of them new members. I like to mix it up for the Solstice weekend, pulling together different people who enjoy camping and biking, and focusing on having fun at an amazing, phenomenally well-organized event. Team members have their own individual racing goals, and there are some internal competitions between friends, but overall, we don't take this event overly seriously as a race. I always figure that if we did, as the captain, it would be my duty to cut myself from the team and look for a better rider - so I'm happy to keep it casual!

That said, we were in 5th place of 127 teams after our first 4 riders (VO2Max, Logan, 'Bent, Angus), and finished 18th after 24 hours with 24 laps. For a fun team, we've got to be happy with that! (Heck, we were 26th for the past two years, and we were happy with that too.)

The roster this year was Knobless (only other 7-time team member besides 'Bent and me), VO2Max and his friend Logan, Smash and LD, Sid, Crooksie, 'Bent and me. Great rides by everyone, with Logan taking the Fastest Lap Award at 45:23, and VO2Max putting in four impressive laps in the 48-50 minute range after a year of national and international cross-country ski competition. Smash came close to his former students with a smokin' 53 minute lap. 'Bent pulled in a 57 minute lap, even as 2000 people watched his recumbent bike go by and said, "No way - that thing can't do single track!"

It was great to see so many friends throughout the weekend, including Rocky, Tiny, several Caledon Navigators, and the folks from the Caledon Cycling Club camped next door. There were a number of appearances by Crash whizzing by on the race track that passed our camp, wearing a different attractive biking outfit every time. Our camp cuisine was taken to a new level with a generous supply of Crash brownies, LD cookies and Pate's Mom's cookies. Yum!!

Lots of fun as always!

For the first time, our 9-member team made it through a full rotation before total darkness fell. Since I always take the last spot in the line-up, I think my first lap has always been dark. So this year it was quite exciting to be able to see for most of my ride, then I just needed lights in the forest sections for the last few km. (Good thing, because my light wasn't aimed well.)

I had done a much better warm-up than usual, but badly misjudged the timing and ended up waiting at the transition area for 30 minutes for a teammate who had crashed. I started my lap with legs that felt like concrete. It didn't take too long to get into the groove though, and the cooler evening weather was sweet. All the riders I encountered this year were super-polite, whether they were passing me or vice versa. Some years I've encountered aggressive riders who have made the racing experience less fun. I think it helped that this year's course had more double track sections where people could pass each other safely and without interfering with one another.

My semi-slick tires worked well. I skidded a little more in some places, but they were nice and speedy on the long open stretches. I felt good about my riding, and made it past a few technical obstacles that I usually wimp out of on our training rides, since I didn't want to hold anyone up. I was hoping to break an hour on this year's faster course, but I missed by 36 seconds - oh well!

It's always fun running errands around Caledon on the day before the 24 Hrs of Summer Solstice. Wherever you go in town, there are cars with bikes on the roof, or hanging off the back, or crammed inside. It's the largest 24 Hour mountain bike relay in North America, and it feels like the whole world is coming to our little town! Fantastic weather forecast - should be a great weekend.

Smash, LD and I headed out on the spur of the moment to do a final pre-ride lap on the 24 Hrs of Summer Solstice course The course is in excellent shape, and the weather was perfect. Smash led with a strong pace throughout. It wasn't quite race pace, but it was a big step up from our Wed. morning group rides, which was the right thing to be doing this close to the race. Halfway around, we discovered Guitar Man hiding under a shady tree, enjoying an easy day out because of his injured ankle. He said he knew it was us coming because he could hear me chattering away!

Around the 4th control in the first sprint last night, the back of my left calf started burning with pain. I hadn't seen a particularly nasty plant, and there didn't seem to be a thorn to remove, so I assumed it was a bee sting. In about 5 minutes, the worst of the pain was gone. When I checked it after the race, there was no mark and no swelling. Strange. And today it's numb and tingly for several cm around that spot, but still nothing to see. Very strange. Weird new plant reaction? Stealth snake with very small fangs?

To celebrate losing a few pounds, I went to Dairy Queen last night. It might take awhile to lose the rest.

Rode to and from Albion Hills for our Wed. morning group ride. This week we had 7 friendly riders, including 3 newcomers! Crash led the way, hotly pursued by El Jefe, 'Bent, LD (aka Mrs. Smash), Stan, Crooksie and me. Crooksie had an impressive crash, but appeared to have recovered from the worst of it by the end of the ride.

We pre-rode the 24 Hrs of Summer Solstice course. All of us who had done the race before found it easier than usual, with fewer hill climbs and less technical riding. We're expecting some fast lap times! I still hadn't changed my semi-slick tires to knobby ones, and after seeing the course, I think I'm going to take a small risk and leave the semi-slicks on. I may skid off some damp tree root at 4 in the morning, but hopefully the need for extra caution in technical sections will be balanced by higher speed on the rest of the lap.

Sid put together a couple of fun courses at Christie Conservation Area for the GHO Sprint Champs. What a treat to have SI at a low-key event like this! Sadly, the best event organizer in the world couldn't have stopped me from messing up my first sprint. In my defence, the map could use some updates. Some of the white open forest is actually dark green, and my biggest error occurred in an area with a huge fence, but it turns out that the fence isn't on the map, although it is close to a hidden one that is. So no wonder I had such trouble finding the trail I was looking for. My next error was just, um, careless.

Anyway, my chances at the GHO Sprint Championship had been dashed, so for Sprint #2, I partnered with 9-year-old AdventureGirl! for a team run. ("Team Doggies", she named us.) She was awesome. We navigated together, and most of the time, she was nice enough to not run too far in front of me. We ran from the final control to the finish line holding hands, like good teammates.

Leanimal and I headed out for our Tuesday run under threatening clouds that gave way to sunshine, heat and humidity. Considering how tired my legs were from Sunday, this was a much better pace than I would have done by myself, which was great! We caught up on as much news as we could squeeze in, since it'll be awhile till we get out together again. Leanimal is off to the 6-day Raid The North Extreme adventure race in beautiful B.C., then when she gets back, we'll be trekking in the Dolomites.

Not sure if I should admit this on Attackpoint, but... Of the 4 orienteering races I did on the weekend, the one where I felt most focused and accurate was the Long course on Sunday. At the start, we were handed a humongous map, and I immediately folded it as I ran to control #1. Throughout the race, I folded and refolded, but never looked at the full map. So last night was the first time I noticed that it was a 1:15,000 scale - I'd done the entire race thinking it was 1:10,000. My first thought was "You idiot!", then my second thought was "Why did this race go better than the maps where I DID know the right scale?" I decided it came down to a couple of things: (1) I was reading features a lot more than I was worrying about distances, and (2) I've orienteered in Copeland Forest before, so some of the areas were familiar. In retrospect, I guess when I did use pace counting, the control was always a bit further away than I expected, but I don't think I ever pace counted more than 150 meters, so the error wasn't glaringly obvious. Interesting.

Something that has come up before, but became really obvious over the last week is that I can't continue in major volunteer roles for two different orienteering clubs. It was a nice idea, but my volunteering-to-orienteering ratio is getting way out of hand, given that orienteering is only one of my volunteer activities. Understandably, in such a volunteer-oriented sport, it's hard to set and stick to limits on how much time and energy I can give to each club, and it feels bad to say no, but I need to say it more often. Must get my various O and non-O commitments sorted out over the next few months.

There are rumours that Raid The North has a low number of entries, so I sent in a $500 deposit today to prove that our team is sincere. (And if the race doesn't run, that will pay for the Fall Champs.) If anyone else wants to do this race and hasn't registered, please do - and consider sending a deposit as well. It would be really disappointing to go through 2007 without a single overnight adventure race. :-(

A hot, sunny day in beautiful Copeland Forest. I had a good night's sleep and an early breakfast with lots to drink. I only had a dozen people to register before the race. So for the only time this weekend, I felt prepared and focused before racing. And that's in spite of the fact that I had to sprint 800 m uphill to the start, arriving 60 seconds before my start time - phew!

I've always felt that Long Distance races should be my forte because I'm an adventure racer, but it's never really turned out that way. Maybe my concentration wavers, or maybe the longer trail runs favour faster runners. Anyway, today went pretty well, for the most part. I still feel rusty running with a map, but not as rusty as I felt 24 hrs ago. I had a bobble at #4 after saying hello to Jon T - who went on to win the race, so clearly HE is able to navigate and talk at the same time. As I left the control, I somehow convinced myself that I was leaving #5 on my way to #6. I tore down the hill to a trail, then glanced at the control description - oops. Luckily, it only took about 30 seconds to fix that. My big mistake was at #10, where I didn't see a narrow spur on the map because there was a trail running along it. So I ended up looking for the control on the wrong side of the hill and got tangled up in some thick stuff before dropping to a trail and running around - and most of the way back up - the hill. Dumb! Looks like a 6-7 minute error. However, I've never run a perfect Long course, and my errors are often more impressive than these, so I was quite pleased. Coming up toward the finish, I glanced at my watch and realized that it was going to be close to 2 hrs, so I sprinted like crazy to see if I could bring it in at 1:59, which sounds so-o-o-o much better. Yay, I did. Looks like I would have won F40+ by 25 minutes, but instead I was 6th/8 in Female Open. If I could have saved just 3.5 minutes at #10, I would have been 4th behind three national team-calibre women, which would have been awesome. So I'm happy with today's outing. But wow, do I ever need more PRACTICE.

GHO's NavStock weekend was a success once again. We had over 80 participants, some of whom had made a long trip from Manitoba, New Brunswick, or the U.S. Wow! Many of them stayed at the group campsite at Bass Lake and/or attended the Saturday potluck BBQ dinner and NavStock Games, organized by the enthusiastic Waterloo Stars orienteering club, who are just excellent folks (with really good-looking club shirts!) The maps were all new or updated, and the courses, designed by Hammer, were challenging and fun. The poison ivy wasn't too thick anywhere I went, and I only had one encounter with stinging nettles. We didn't lose anyone in the woods permanently (although we were definitely wondering for awhile). We had lots of sun with a brief sprinkle of rain between the Middle Distance and the Sprint event. All in all, a great weekend of orienteering and socializing. Special thanks to the club members who came to this event only to work and not to orienteer - GHOSlow, Mrs. GHOSlow, Backwoods and Grizz.

Between late night registration paperwork, warm temperatures for tent sleeping and a 4:30 a.m. bird symphony, I only got 3 hours of sleep. Crap. This may be the only Sprint/Middle/Long orienteering event that I do in 2007, and I was really hoping to use this weekend to seriously work on my orienteering. It's not that I cared about my ranking that much, but I wanted to work on all aspects of trying to orienteer well, e.g. proper sleep, nutrition, hydration, mental preparation, warm-up, etc. I was off to a bad start, plus I'd managed to dehydate myself along the way.

I was busy at the campsite checking people in and helping some first-time orienteers until shortly before my start time, and when I got to the race site, the list and waivers that I'd sent earlier with a participant hadn't been delivered to the registration area yet, so a number of people went into the woods without waivers signed. Argggh - it's impossible to be two places at once, but I still felt like I'd messed up.

And so I headed into the woods for the Middle Distance with minimal warm-up and my brain on a different planet from the race map. Too bad, because this is usually my best distance. I had to check out several rock piles in the dark green at #3, but I wasn't the only one. Then on the way to #4, I bushwhacked across to the 2nd trail when I should have gone to the 3rd trail. By the time I figured it out, I had gone well down the trail, made a turn, and was finally wondering why it was going the direction it was. Luckily, I saw my error and managed to relocate quickly - but I was a lo-o-ong way from where I wanted to be. Then when I got in the right area, things started to look wrong again, so I retraced my steps briefly, then decided to push on to meet a major trail. Phew - a flag suddenly appeared on a spur. It felt like a 25-minute split, but it was only 15:30. Looking at the results, it was probably a 6-7 minute error, even though it felt like much more. Fortunately, things went fine after that - plus or minus a few minor details - like running right past the 2nd last control to the finish, because I thought a control at a trail junction must be on the kids' course (no, I hadn't looked at my control description yet!)

I'd entered the Female Open category because I thought there would be a longer race course, and I never got around to moving back to my age category after finding out that we would all be running the same distances. So I would have won F40+, but instead I ended up getting my butt kicked by most of the young ladies - and rightly so.

Sprint around Bass Lake Campground. This is a really fun map for a sprint, with lots of variety and a surprising amount of climb and bushwhacking for a campground sprint. It was a busy afternoon, and I wasn't at the start line yet when I heard my name called with a minute to go - yikes, that got the adrenaline flowing!! I felt happier with this race than the one this morning, but actually, my relative results were slightly worse. I guess I just don't have the speed for a 3K race - oh well, I can live with that.

Event: Nav-Stock
 

NavStock Night-O on a new and very hilly map! Perfect location for a night-O, with a good trail system to keep people from getting too lost in the dark. After a hot, smoggy, stressful day trying to get other things accomplished, followed by nasty traffic on the drive north which made us late, it was nice to just get into the woods and breathe in the cool air. Most of the time, I just went at the speed that I would go in a standard training run on trails by myself. I wasn't in race mode mentally or physically, since I'd just dashed over from the campsite where I'd been signing people in, then there was some confusion over camping and event registrations awaiting me at the race. I need a clone!

In hindsight, I should have used more channels to promote tonight's Night-O and Sunday's Long-O to adventure racers. Several of them came out anyway, but I think that lots of ARers would have enjoyed one or both events. Speaking of which... a tip of the hat goes to Slice and Leanimal for coming in 4th in a field of experienced orienteers tonight!

Easy run around tonight's orienteering training course to ensure that all of my hot pink flagging tape was still in place. It looked as if the wind hadn't so much as ruffled it over the past two days. I knew the route, so it's debatable whether this was orienteering, but I did practise the orienteering skill of running with my head up so I could make better micro-route choices in the woods.

Wildlife Watch: One deer who didn't run away because she thought I hadn't seen her - yay. One wolf in the middle of the forest while I was bushwhacking. Oh, wait that can't be right, because there ARE no wolves in Palgrave, and if there were, they wouldn't be wearing dog tags and being called by their owners. But that didn't prevent me from being very startled.

'Bent was Last Out First In - good for him. Smash really took my map memory exercise to heart, setting off from one control while thinking he was at another one. He got into some thick, nasty, swampy bits, and made it most of the way to Yellowknife before he broke down and looked at his map a second time. He made it back to unlock his vehicle and share some oh-so-yummy L-D cookies with the rest of us. (BTW Smash, you do have the right to choose your own Attackpoint name, but only if you sign up. Otherwise, it's our call. :-) )

Dusk and night ride at Albion Hills with Guitar Man and his back-up band of Alan, Crash, Smash, Bash and 'Bent. (Our AP names may sound harmonious, but this was actually our first gig all together.) I LOVE riding in the cool night air after a hot smoggy day. Unfortunately, I'd had no time to change to my knobby tires, so there were a few places where I had to be cautious. Mostly I felt great. At one point, I smashed my helmet into a low-hanging tree branch and knocked my light off so that it pointed toward the ground - oops! Poor 'Bent lost his favourite bike multi-tool after fixing my wobbly seat. Saving me from sitting down hard on a bare seat post while riding bumpy single track was such a chivalrous act that I will go shopping on his behalf.

Things on my to-do list over the past couple of days:
1) Run an orienteering club training night.
2) Mad final preparations and communications in my role as registrar for 80 people coming to the NavStock orienteering weekend, run by my OTHER orienteering club.
3) Book a hotel room in Venice. (Took TWO hours to find something appropriate. The first hotel Expedia listed cost $739/night.)
4) Do my corporate year-end.
5) Line up or take photos for 3 upcoming articles
6) Debate via e-mail the agenda and refreshments for the Caledon Community Map Launch (an environmental project, not an orienteering one)
7) Charge and test mountain bike lights for 24-hr bike relay
8) Provide estimate on updating the Town's greenhouse gas inventory and local action plan on climate change.

Yawn... I'm exhausted, but at least I guess I haven't fallen into a rut!

3rd edition of the Wed. morning group ride, with perfect weather once again. (Although it became a scorcher by mid-day, so I'm glad we got out when we did.) We had 6 people out today, three of whom I didn't know two weeks ago, which is very cool. The riders were 'Bent, Guitar Man, Ross, Stan, Crash and me. It was great to be back on the trails biking with Crash again. Now that she's a regular on the O Cup Expert category podium, she's even more awesome to watch in the technical sections, and she has a great bunny hop too. In Smash's absence, Crash was polite enough to do some videography for 'Bent. He is working feverishly to create a YouTube video of the Wed. morning group, including a few choice shots of his recumbent bike on single track.

I braved the heat, insects and stinging nettles (and apparently Crash's mountain bike too - although I didn't see her) to hang flags for Thursday's Caledon Navigators training night in Palgrave. Unfortunately, the course I'd designed so carefully on paper just didn't work when I started looking at the terrain. I've tried to design it so that the early controls are suitable for kids and families, then there are a few more challenging controls at the end. Unfortunately, some of the kids' portion included trails that were nearly invisible in deep grass, huge clumps of knee-deep poison ivy, and a few storm-felled trees hovering over the ground. So I did a quick redesign and did some extra running around as a result.

The plan is that the adults will do the training as a memory O exercise as much as possible, which is intended to compensate for some of the controls being easier than usual.

Wildlife Watch: Many, many mosquitoes. That's OK - I'm working on building up my immunity to West Nile. A white-tailed deer bounded away at one point. Most interesting was a female wild turkey that was crouching flat to the ground, definitely hoping that I wouldn't notice her. She was just lying in dry pine needles, and there was no evidence of a nest, but for her sake, I hope that's what was going on, because she didn't look very well. I had a control hung about 15 m away, so I had to find a new location for it, just in case she is still around on Thursday night. I don't want to traumatize her!

K/O, in case you're out there... I am doing some ankle exercises at odd times, e.g. while standing in line-ups or watching TV. I should be spending a solid block of time on it each day, but I wanted you to know that I am not ignoring my girlie ankle!

Approximate - six 2-minute intervals at 90% effort.

'Bent and I headed over to Island Lake to paddle on a very pleasant evening. This was the first time that I'd taken my Garmin Forerunner along, and it was fun to check our pace from time to time. What was interesting was watching the law of diminishing returns. For this particular canoe with our paddling configuration in tonight's weather, we could usually paddle along at more than 7.5 kph with the feeling that we could maintain that pace all night. During the intervals, we usually hit 9 kph, and we reached a max of 9.6 kph at one point. But unlike our "cruising", the intervals were exhausting work that I couldn't maintain for long. The paddle started giving me hot spots on my hands, too. In a long distance race, I'd rather stick with the cruising, for all the difference it makes.

We had Coach Bill Trayling's words ringing in our ears tonight, as we always do when we work on technique. "Your arms should be wet noodles!" "Barb, sit up straight. Open that belly button RIGHT up!" "Richard, you're supposed to be conducting an orchestra - NOT wrestling a moose!!"

Wildlife Watch: Great Blue Heron, Kingfishers

As we approached the dock, there was an Orangeville fire truck and a group of fit-looking young fire fighters standing by the water learning how to use a throw rope. As we were leaving, they were learning how to get water from the lake into their fire hose.

Speaking of Orangeville fire fighters, don't forget to check on the progress of our fellow adventure racer, Glenn Edwards, as he rows across the Indian Ocean. If you're inspired, you can make a donation to the Children's Wish Foundation while you're at his site.

ThunderDog and I went for a hike to help break in my new hiking boots. I don't feel like there is enough time really, but today I developed a new sense of urgency after trying on my two comfy old pairs of hiking boots and making the upsetting discovery that my feet have grown too big for them! I remember hearing long-term adventure racers say that their feet have grown up to 2.5 sizes larger since getting involved in endurance sports. I guess it's happening to me, too.

5 Peaks Durham Forest

I probably wouldn't have done this race so soon after pushing so hard at the Ancaster Old Mill 10K, but I'd bought the event entry at a silent auction fundraiser awhile ago. So I decided not to race all out today. I just treated it like a training run with faster runners. Normally, if I'm trying to race, I keep looking for pony tails ahead of me, then I see if I can catch them. If any woman who looks my age dares to pass me, I accelerate if I've got anything left. But today I set different goals:

1) Run the entire race, including all the steep, twisty single track. ---> I almost succeeded at this, but there was one very steep hill where I came up behind a line of walkers on a narrow trail - it looked like a photo of the Chilkoot Pass in the Gold Rush. Running up that hill would have been hard enough, but to go onto uneven off-trail terrain to pass all those people... well, I just didn't have it in me. I did sprint up the final part when there were only a few people left to pass.

2) Reach the 6K marker without wishing the race was over. I'm good at pacing for long-term endurance, but not good at pacing for "sprints" like this, so in both the Ancaster and 5 Peaks Albion races, I pushed too hard early on and spent the last few km wishing I was at the finish. ---> I succeeded at this. The second half of the race felt pretty good and my splits for the 1st half and 2nd half were identical.

3) Don't get poison ivy - which was everywhere! ---> It's only 30 hrs ago, so it's too early to know whether I escaped.

4) Run in difficult technical terrain without my Active Ankle to improve my proprioception - and don't twist the darned ankle again. ---> Successful.

It was a beautiful day for running; much of the race course passed through cool, shady forest. Since I didn't want to push hard, I made sure to let gravity work for me when it could, going fast on the downhills. I had no trouble ignoring what other runners did, since my goals for the race had nothing to do with them. So it was just plain fun!

Compared to 5 Peaks Albion, my pace was slower - but I think most people went a little slower, since the course travelled more single track. Compared to last year's 5 Peaks Durham race, my pace was 15 sec/km faster, which is cool, because I pushed harder last year (and - sigh - weighed less). I was 10th of 38 in my age group today, finishing in the top 20% of women overall. That's good for me.

Great race for 'Bent at 55 min. Winning time of 45 min was set by orienteer Laszlo Orosz. 'Bent had no nav errors this year! (The course is fully marked, but last year didn't go so well for 'Bent.) We were excited for our high school adventure racer friends. One of them won the age 15-19 category in the 5K event, and the other won his category in our 12K event, finishing 7th overall of 306 racers! Those kids are awesome!!

Adventure Attic called, and unfortunately they've had to cancel the Adventure category of their canoe race on Sunday due to lack of entries. I'd hoped that the adventure racing community would embrace this great new event, but I guess it's a busy time of year with all kinds of events going on.

Our canoe is too long for the Family category, which means we would start with a time penalty. That's not so bad, but we would also have to borrow basic canoe paddles from someone tomorrow, since for years we have only used bent shaft paddles - or kayak paddles for adventure racing - and both of these are prohibited in the Family category. Also, the Family category race course is only 5K, which is pretty short compared to the drive to the race. So we are reluctantly withdrawing from the event. I'm sure they would have refunded our entry fee, but we've left it with them as a donation, since the event is a charitable fundraiser.

Sorry, Mique! You tried super-hard to drum up enthusiasm. Hope it's a big success anyway.

Oooh, my quads are sooooo sore from the 10K! I guess that's good.

I was talking with some AP folks recently about tick-borne encephalitis in Europe. I had the understanding that the vaccine wasn't available in the U.S. It turns out that it is easily obtained in Canada. Unfortunately, we are supposed to take 2 shots one month apart (with a booster at 9 months), so it is too late for our upcoming trip. There is a 2-week rapid immunization schedule that would provide a lower level of immunity, but our travel clinic doesn't want to do that.

On the same topic, I couldn't find permethrin tick repellent/pesticide in Canada, but I was able to get some by mail from REI in the U.S.

Totally unrelated... I had a funny conversation recently with a woman who is a strong mountain biker. She was talking about early dates with men who hear that she bikes, so they want to go out on the trails with her, but they can rarely keep up. According to her, "I HATE having to fake it on dates!!! Ooooh, that hill was SO tough to climb - I had to get off and push my bike. Wow, that log was scary to ride over!!" Etc. :-)))

Wed. morning group ride at Albion Hills. 'Bent and I were joined by Eric, Suze and Smash. (The latter was formerly known as Angus, until he splattered himself on the trails during a recent night ride, breaking his glasses and getting blood all over everything. There were still some droplets on his helmet, which was sobering.)

It was a beautiful cool morning that turned sunny while we were riding. My legs started out feeling like concrete after last night's effort. They never got exactly zippy, but I managed to ride at a reasonable pace.

We met two ladies walking dogs on leash. Apparently, the previous mountain biker who passed them (before they were on leash, maybe) had emptied a water bottle on one of the dogs and complained that it wasn't right beside the woman. Arggh - it's tough enough for bikers to get trail access that I think we all need to be good ambassadors for the sport at all times. It's just dumb to ride on the double track at Albion Hills - which has a large, active campground - without staying on constant alert for children (less predictable than dogs) and other hikers.

McMaster Sprint. This was the first orienteering course designed by Slice and Bob, and it was a fun course with lots of route choice. (Thanks for setting it up!!) Slice warned us that it would be a bit long, but that was fine on such a beautiful night for running. I could tell that it's been awhile since I've done real orienteering. My reflexes were a bit rusty - I must look for more opportunities to get out with a map.

Speaking of rusty reflexes, my quads are now at the stage where it hurts to go downstairs frontwards. I guess my legs have had enough for a little while after last night's race and today's two outings.

Event: The Ancaster Old Mill Race
 

I decided to go to this race two hrs before I had to leave. I'd already paid for it, but I felt like crap this morning after barely sleeping last night due to a pounding headache that continued until this afternoon, making me feel nauseated. Anyway, I knocked back a bunch of Advils and hoped for the best. This race does have an excellent post-race meal, after all.

My plan is to use this race as an annual time trial, since last year was my first road 10K in many years, and I thought it would be interesting to see how my speed changes over the years on the same course. Everyone says that this isn't a 10K where anyone will get a PB, due to all the hills. (Note to You-Know-Who: that is NOT a sandwich.) I was surprised to finish 15 seconds faster than last year and repeat as 3rd/17 in my age group and 22nd/126 women. This mostly reflects the nice cool weather we had, since I know I felt better and stronger, and weighed 6 lb. less going into last year's race. Still, I'm pleased that I could hold it together on a day when my body was operating at a less-than-optimum level.

One thing I've worked on over the past 18 months is speeding up in shorter events. I tend to have one default gear that I use for everything, and I used to cross the finish line in shorter events feeling like I could have done more. I've also been concerned after learning that I'm around the age where you must use or forever lose any fast-twitch muscle fibres that you might have. (I suspect that I have exactly two - one in each leg.) Anyway, I'm not so good at estimating these faster paces, and today I learned that I have perfected my 8K pace. Too bad it was a 10K race. After seeing no women nearby for several km, about a dozen women passed me in in the final kilometer. I had no last kick left in me to go after them, and when I crossed the finish line, I felt a bit overdone. According to my Forerunner, my pace didn't fall much in the final kilometers, so maybe this isn't a problem, and those women would have passed me sooner or later. On the other hand, maybe I should reduce the chocolate and lose that extra weight.

Big congrats to Sudden for taking a good chunk out of his time from last year and placing 8th overall. He is tearing up all the race courses this year!!

About 3/4 of the way through Friday's flying, my bad knee started aching horribly, and it took most of Saturday to feel better. Given that the original injury appeared late in a 4-day kayak trip when my knee had been locked in one position for hours at a time, I guess that long flights aren't good for me. Glad I'm not a frequent business traveller anymore - I used to fly several times each week - yuck. My knee really hurt today, starting early in the first flight. Hope I'm OK for tomorrow's race. I sure haven't trained properly!!

'Bent and I took kayaks on scenic, rocky Great Slave Lake, heading from Yellowknife down past Mosher Island, then we kept going until we had used up half of our allotted time. The wind was with us, and there was a small craft warning for later, so we didn't want to get too far away. At our farthest point, we went ashore and climbed up a big rocky hill to get a good view of the ice, which was now only 15 kayak-minutes away from us. Cool!! We stayed closer to shore on our way back and didn't get affected too much by the headwind. Nice way to start our day!

Miscellaneous other canoe paddles:
- Mainland house to houseboat, where we switched to kayaks.
- Houseboat to mainland, to do some errands onshore
- Mainland back to houseboat
- Houseboat to mainland for girls' outing to northern art gallery, followed by wine and snacks on a sunny deck
- Mainland to houseboat when we finally started feeling guilty about leaving the two guys with the baby all afternoon
- Houseboat to mainland for Arctic char dinner at Bullock's

'Bent's brother was adamant that he was going to get one of us (ideally 'Bent) to change a diaper so that we could "understand his life". We countered with a suggestion that he could come hiking through a chest-deep swamp with us at 2 a.m. so that he could understand our lives. We didn't end up changing any diapers...

It was my niece's 1st birthday party, which meant more paddling than yesterday.
- Canoed from Back Bay to the houseboat in the morning to have breakfast, blow up balloons, hang streamers and entertain baby with silly antics while her parents did essential pre-party tasks.
- Kayaked to Back Bay to let dog out at the place where we are housesitting/dogsitting.
- Kayaked back to the houseboat for the party. I've never been in the presence of so many children aged two and under. It was a great party, and they all had fun, but it was overwhelming for a person accustomed to dogs rather than toddlers. Fantastic chocolate banana cake made it all worth it though, not to mention the exuberant smile on our niece's frosting-covered face.
- 'Bent got in some extra paddling, since he was assigned to shuttling the few boatless guests back and forth from the mainland.
- Canoed from houseboat to mainland for a grocery run.
- Canoed from houseboat to Back Bay for the night. Was trying to remain on Ontario time due to our short visit, but I think I've blown it tonight. It's hard to sleep when it doesn't get dark.

We're visiting 'Bent's brother in Yellowknife. He lives on a houseboat on Great Slave Lake with his wife and baby daughter. We are staying on the mainland, so this weekend will include some paddling training, even if we don't have time for much else. Today's paddles included some back-and-forth to the mainland, plus a circuit of Joliffe Island, using both kayaks and canoes. Weather is uncomfortably hot, but you can see ice on the lake on the horizon, since it only went out during the last week. If we get the chance - and if the weather is good - we'd like to paddle out to the ice, which is apparently about 8 km away. The water is frigid, so it would have to be very calm for us to try it. There's not a lot of passing boat traffic to pick us out of the water if we fall in. The ice was spectacular flying over Great Slave Lake on our way in.